First Aid Course: Blended HLTAID011 Training and Assessment

Our HLTAID011 First Aid course uses blended delivery: self-paced online learning followed by face-to-face training and assessment. Complete the online component before attending. Our official page lists up to six hours for e-learning and four hours for the face-to-face component. Successful completion leads to a Statement of Attainment for HLTAID011.

View our official course details and booking information. Course details checked 2 October 2026.

Course background and related accredited requirements

First aid training records and current workplace competence are different questions. Check both the national assessment requirements and the refresher requirements for your role.

The units

All three sit on our scope at extent deliver and assess, aligned to our registration period ending 30 June 2032.

All three come from the HLT Health Training Package, and HLTAID009 and HLTAID011 are Release 1, endorsed 16 October 2020. The training package is maintained by HumanAbility, the Jobs and Skills Council responsible for the health, aged care, disability and early childhood sectors. That matters for a practical reason: the body that decides what a first aid unit contains is not the body that decides how often you should redo it. Those are two different institutions, and the confusion over expiry lives in the gap between them.

HLTAID011 is the standard workplace first aid unit. HLTAID009 is CPR alone, and is contained within HLTAID011. HLTAID014 is the advanced unit for higher-risk settings.

None of the three is equivalent to its predecessor. That is a separate point from currency and it catches people out: if you hold HLTAID003, you do not hold HLTAID011, and the national register does not deem them interchangeable. The route to the current unit requires a provider’s assessment of the applicable training or recognition pathway. Non-equivalent units do not support an automatic credit transfer or replacement award.

So there are two different reasons an old first aid certificate may not do what you need: the code is superseded and not equivalent, and the training may be older than your workplace accepts. They are independent, and a provider that blurs them is not helping you.

First aid currency and refresher training

A Statement of Attainment records completed training. HLTAID011 does not set a single universal expiry period; it directs learners to the relevant work health and safety regulator for licensing, regulatory and refresher requirements.

Safe Work Australia’s model code recommends CPR refresher training annually and renewal of first aid qualifications every three years. The model code’s legal status depends on its adoption in the relevant jurisdiction. Workplace, industry and sector requirements may impose additional obligations. Confirm the requirements for your role with your employer and regulator.

Keep practising your skills between courses. Practice sessions support competence but do not replace required refresher training. See the national unit and the model first-aid code.

What the assessment actually requires

The reason a first aid unit cannot be delivered as a read-and-click course is not a policy preference. It is written into the unit's performance evidence, and the detail is specific enough to check a provider against.

For HLTAID011, managing an unconscious, non-breathing adult, a candidate must:

• perform at least 2 minutes of uninterrupted single-rescuer CPR, being 5 cycles of both compressions and ventilations, on an adult resuscitation manikin placed on the floor
• follow the prompts of an automated external defibrillator to deliver at least one shock
• demonstrate a rotation of single-rescuer operators with minimal interruption to compressions
• respond appropriately to regurgitation or vomiting

And, separately, managing an unconscious, non-breathing infant:

• perform at least 2 minutes of uninterrupted single-rescuer CPR, again 5 cycles of compressions and ventilations, on an infant resuscitation manikin placed on a firm surface

Three things follow from that list, and each one is useful when comparing providers:

1. The adult manikin goes on the floor and the infant manikin on a firm surface. Those are not stylistic notes; they are the assessment conditions, and they are why a kitchen table demonstration is not the unit.
2. An AED training device is required equipment, alongside adult and infant manikins meeting Australian Resuscitation Council guidelines, and personal protective equipment. A course that never puts a defibrillator trainer in your hands has not assessed the AED requirement.
3. Rotation of operators is assessed. Ask us how the practical assessment provides the required participants and equipment.

The unit does allow the performance evidence to be gathered in a simulated environment, expressly because of the nature of the training — you cannot wait for a real cardiac arrest. But the simulation must reproduce a realistic in-depth scenario with all the relevant equipment and resources of the workplace or community setting. Simulated is not the same as notional.

Why hospitality is a first aid setting

Worth stating, because it is easy to treat first aid as generic. A commercial kitchen and a busy service floor concentrate a specific set of hazards: burns and scalds, deep knife cuts, slips on wet floors, anaphylaxis from an allergen error, and choking. Late-night licensed venues add intoxicated patrons and the assessment problems that come with them.

Food safety controls help prevent incidents; first aid concerns the response when an incident occurs. Allergen management and anaphylaxis response are distinct responsibilities. See Food Safety Supervisor and food handling for the food safety pathways.

Practical notes

• First aid units cannot be completed entirely online. They require practical demonstration including manikin-based CPR assessment, to the standard set out above. Blended delivery with an in-person practical is normal; a fully online "certificate" with no practical assessment is not delivering the unit.
• Who may assess HLTAID011. Assessors must meet the applicable RTO assessor requirements and hold HLTAID011 or demonstrate equivalent skills and knowledge to that unit. Holding the CPR-only unit alone does not establish equivalence to the full first-aid unit. See the assessment conditions.
• No prerequisite qualification applies to any of the three units.
• USI arrangements. For nationally recognised training, a Unique Student Identifier (USI) is generally required before a qualification or Statement of Attainment can be issued, unless an applicable exemption applies. See the official USI exemption guidance. A USI is free at usi.gov.au. If you already have one, recover it rather than creating another.
• Check the RTO code, not the brand. We use several business names. Check the issuing RTO code as well as the name on the document. Verify it on training.gov.au.
• Confirm the current fee directly. Fees change and a figure published on a page ages badly.

Where first aid units sit in qualifications

First aid appears as an elective across a broad span of our scope, including SIT30622, SIT30821, SIT40422, SIT40521 and SIT50422, as well as the community services qualifications CHC33021, CHC43015 and CHC43415.

Completing a first aid unit standalone produces a Statement of Attainment that credit-transfers into any of those under Standard 1.7 of the Outcome Standards — no reassessment, your Statement of Attainment is the evidence. Raise it at the pre-training review, required under Standard 2.2 of the Outcome Standards for RTOs. We verify evidence of equivalent prior completion, check the training-product requirements and any licensing or regulatory restrictions, and document the decision before granting credit. See ASQA’s credit-transfer guidance.

Our scope carries 17 current qualifications, 81 current skill sets and 579 current units across sixteen training packages, including 23 current HLT health units — see about us and all courses.

One sector note: if you work in aged care, disability or childcare, food safety in those settings is covered by HLTFSE001, HLTFSE005 and HLTFSE007. Those three units are the published minimum competency standard for a food safety supervisor in the health and community services sectors in Victoria and Queensland; New South Wales names no sector units of its own. They are different units again from both first aid and the hospitality food safety units, and only HLTFSE001 is on our scope — see Food Safety Supervisor for what that means in practice.

About us

We are Complete Hospitality Training, RTO 3722, CRICOS provider code 04242E, Level 3, 28 Elizabeth Street, Melbourne VIC 3000, and 410 Elizabeth Street, Surry Hills NSW 2010. Contact melbourne@cht.edu.au or +61 3 9654 1554. See about us and all courses.

HLTAID009, HLTAID011 and HLTAID014 are on our scope of registration as deliver and assess.

We link to the relevant course and regulatory sources in this guide. Check those sources for current requirements, and confirm course availability, delivery, fees and entry requirements with us before enrolling.